Another One?

Like many Sox fans I hoped for the best and suspected the worst, all I can say is I am sad to hear that Ortiz was using steroids. I knew it, I hoped I was wrong but I knew that he was using PED’s, 50 homeruns out of nowhere? The sudden decline and knee injuries? All I can say is that I don’t think he used heavily considering that he doesn’t look much bigger than when he was with the Twins, I think juiced in 03 – 06 and stopped 07 – 09. Another thing I will say, I don’t care if he used steroids, he’s not using them now and is hitting better than ever all it took was for him to believe in himself. Ortiz faked his way into being Big Papi, now he’s earning it. I still am strongly against steroids; there are no short cuts to true greatness, the only path is hard work and determination.

Why Name Tags Aren't All That Great

I have to say that I feel somewhat funny after writing that post (not in the humorous sense but in an odd sense) I feel almost like I woke up after a long sleep, or walked from a dark room into the light, I hope and pray that God will continue to reveal to me who He is instead of who I imagined Him to be. The greatest danger is to characterize God, to refer to Him in human or at least worldly terms this brings Him down to our level only for us to realize our character god isn’t real and not even close to the real God, this among other things is my error it’s easy to imagine God as a large man in a throne in (as Lewis calls it ) a “sky palace” but Heaven and God are both unimaginably hard things to describe and should be left without description. To say “Heaven is like a different world that is white and pure and perfect and golden and musical…” is false, to say Heaven is where God is, is true (Lewis talks about this, don’t think this is completely my own thinking though part of it is). God is too big to be defined, I guess you could describe Him the way He did, He is who He is Exodus 3: 14, that is the only worldly description available for us to use.

Really Long Post About Faith

C.S. Lewis said in his article “Is Theism Important?” that there are two types of faith, faith A and faith B. Faith A is what I am looking for, physical proof that God is real, real knowledge, for example I know that the grass is green. Faith B is different; it is more of a trust or confidence, like in family or friends. I agree with Lewis if we try to get the “religious experience” from pure knowledge then we’ll get nothing. I had faith B, when I first went to church I gained faith B, when I began to pray and read the Bible I had faith B, now I’m trying to find faith A. To put it simply faith A doesn’t exist here on earth the only time it did was a short segment of history called “Jesus’ life”. True faith requires trust, or a better word confidence. I don’t like to use trust in the sense that we “blindly” trust, which it implies to me; confidence is trust but in a different way, it is trusting ourselves. I trust my intellect when taking a test, if I didn’t I would fail. I trust my athleticism when I play baseball, if I didn’t I would be an error and strike out machine. I would trust my instincts if a strange person is walking toward me, if I didn’t I could get hurt. We trust ourselves all the time, we are confident in our abilities and also friends, for example I could say I am confident that my friend didn’t steal (hypothetically) my CD, or I trust him enough with access to it because I am confident he won’t. I am confident that the men who wrote the Bible thousands of years ago told the truth, one, because I am confident in historical accuracy but also I trust that because the historical parts are accurate it is true. I hope this isn’t confusing cause I got some more. If we attempt to prove the existence of God through logic only we will fail, of course there is some logic but then that isn’t faith, it’s knowledge. I love my family, it can’t be logically proven but it is true, I trust myself to know the difference between fact and fiction, I know what happened to me July 15, 2005 and the April before (fact) I know how Christianity changed me more than anything else (fact) I know I heard God’s voice (or a voice that wasn’t human or audibly heard but heard all the same: fact), can I trust myself with this knowledge and pursue faith B along with the logical sense I have? This is a long post but the idea excites me that Lewis pursued the subject I’ve struggled to grasp, I honestly feel God pushed me to buy this book (which I almost didn’t but felt I should) and pushed me to read it and then had me search for this article. Real faith comes through experience I trust my friends because I know them, I trust my family because they raised me, I trust myself because I have to, I trust God because He has revealed Himself to me. God enters our lives periodically (though no routinely) to reveal who He is, Jesus did it to the disciples and so does His Father to us. God showed me grace in hopes I would believe, He showed me love in hope I would return it He will come back again and show me another wonder of life it is up to me to both recognize and return the gift of faith He showers us with.

There's a Light at the End of this Tunnel

I have just one question, how long? I know why this is happening to me but how long will this pain go on, a life without God is unbearable, I’ve been cramming anything I can into my heart just to fill the emptiness, it’s like putting water in a colander, no matter how much I put in it will never be filled up. I read something today that gives me courage, I remembered that I am loved, I remembered the first time I went to my church and felt the love of Jesus for the first time the feeling that I am cared for. I hope God comes back shortly but if He doesn’t I hope I can be strong till then. All I want right now is for this to be in the past, to sit on my front porch with my Bible and enjoy my life, to go to church and feel God’s presence, to write with meaning and clarity, that is what I want and hope for. All I have now is the prayers of my friends and family adn a glimmer of hope for the future.

What is "loving the world" and How do We Stop?

I’ve been going to my dad’s Bible study and lately we’ve been reading 1 John. One verse that stood out to me was 2: 15, “Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” But what exactly does that mean? We can’t go around hating the world, it would be weird to wake up and look out the window and say “Gosh I hate this planet we live on!” First off God made the world, second when He made it Genesis 1:10 says that “God saw that [the earth] was good” so to claim the earth is “bad” would call God’s creation bad and thus insult Him. Think about it this way, let’s say you work all day on this special dinner and then your guest comes and spits it out. But then what does hating the world mean? The key word in the verse is “love”, we are to love God, love Jesus, love others as ourselves, but to love the world would put it in the same esteem. Also world in the Biblical sense is not the dirt under our feet but the things of the world: activities, people, money, sin… I like to play baseball, I like to cook, I like my job but if those things ever reach the importance level of God in my life then there is trouble. If I skip my devotions to get to work or neglect my prayers because I’m tired after watching the Sox game, and who knows I could be late for work or really tired, but we can’t let the world get in the way of God. What do we do then? Well a start would be to find a way to integrate God into our life, for example I make a cross sign on my chest and look up before every at-bat and I try to be the kindest and most helpful person at work. It can get tough but we must remember the promise, 1 John 2: 17 “but the man who does the will of God lives forever.”

Dissapointed Sox Fan

Hopefully I will be proved wrong, but at the moment the Red Sox are under preforming, they aren't hitting and the pitching is shaky. I don't know what else to say, the only guys who are producing are Pedroia, Youk, and Ortiz; I don't even want to know what happened to Bay but he is headed for a below .200 average if he keeps this up. I sure hope the Sox pull it together cause right now watching their games just makes me angry and sad. The Yankees are going to take the lead and the Sox are headed for a long and tough pennant race.

Catching in Fenway